Eighteenth-century Virginians denominated
counterfeiting a capital crime in
two senses of the word. An attack on the currency,
and therefore the economy, of his majesty's
colony, it was treason, a felony punishable by the
hangman.

Consider the case of silversmith Lowe Jackson,
turned off on Williamsburg's gallows, despite pleas
from the powerful for his pardon, for making his
own Spanish doubloons. The beginning of his end
was the attempt of Williamsburg barber Robert
Lyon to spend one of the bogus coins in the summer
of 1750. As General Court Judge John Blair described
it, Lyon was taken to the courthouse, where
some of the doubloons were broken and "except for a
thin plate of Gold on the out Side, were found stark
nought."

Blair suspected someone was using Lyon as a
front to get the fake money in circulation. Blair put
his money on Jackson. A Nansemond County silversmith,
Jackson once had been tried for counterfeiting
but escaped punishment through, as Blair put it,
"some chicanery of the lawyers."

Threatened with trial for uttering the counterfeits—
conviction meant death—Lyon told "all he
knew." He said sometime Annapolis tavernkeeper
Edward Rumney—"aged about 40 Years, of a middle
Size, full faced, black Complection, smooth Tongue,
and free of Speech, much addicted to playing at Billiards,
and Gaming"—took him to Jackson and that
he was "drawn in much against his Will."

Jackson told Lyon that he and his brothers John
and James made the coins and that "they were little
worse than good Ones." Blair issued a warrant for
their arrest, but the sheriff found they had fled.
Blair guessed John and James Jackson had "gone to
the Northward, but" supposed Lowe Jackson "to be
gone to North Carolina."

Virginia Council President Thomas Lee issued
a hue and cry—a proclamation authorizing the
pursuit and capture of suspects. It charged Lowe
Jackson, a carbuncle-faced young man of about five-
feet-ten, "with coining, counterfeiting, and uttering
many base double Double-Loons." His brothers,
one a watchmaker and the other a blacksmith, "are
strongly suspected of being concerned in the said
Treason." Rumney, who Lee thought had gone to
Maryland, too, was accused "with aiding and assisting."
Lee offered a £50 reward for Lowe Jackson and
£20 for the other three.

Authorities captured Lowe Jackson in
Charlestown, South Carolina, and the Virginia
Council sent Edmund Ruffin to bring
him back to Williamsburg for trial. What became of
the other fugitives, we do not know.

Before a crowd, Jackson was tried in the General
Court on April 16, 1751. The record is gone, but it
appears Lyon's testimony was discredited. The jury,
deliberating until "between 6 & 7 in the Evening,"
convicted Jackson anyway.

Within days, there was talk of a new trial.
The Reverend David Masson and other prominent
Williamsburg people thought Jackson should be
pardoned. Lewis Burwell, now council president,
had power to pardon "fit Objects of Mercy, Treason
and willfull Murder only excepted," wrote a letter to
the Duke of Bedford begging for the king to pardon
Jackson, and granted a reprieve until the king's
pleasure was known. He said Jackson was a young
man who was seduced by Rumney, "an infamous
Villain who had the Art of Counterfeiting Coins and
put this Youth upon it." Carter Burwell of Carter's
Grove also wrote on Jackson's behalf. Blair and the
other councilors disagreed with Burwell, however,
and wrote the duke opposing a pardon.

Newly arrived Governor Robert Dinwiddie examined
the trial record and said that the "Tryal I find
was conducted with much Candour & Impartiality"
and "I cannot possibly join the President in Soliciting
his Majesties Pardon & do think the Councills
Remonstrance & Representation of the Affair is perfectly
Just." The king declined to intercede.

April 13, 1753, after languishing in the
Williamsburg jail for nearly two years, Jackson was
executed "at the Gallows near this City." The Pennsylvania
Gazette reported:

He was drawn on a Sledge from the Prison
to the Place of Execution where he addressed
himself to the Spectators, in a very moving and
pathetic Speech on the fatal Consequences attending
an early Habit of Vice, which had been
the Means of bringing him to that shameful
and untimely End. He appears with a Composure
of Mind, not frequently attending Men in
his unhappy Circumstances, and died in a very
penitent Manner. His body being put into a
Coffin, with this Inscription, Mercy! Triumph
over Justice, was delivered to his Friends, and
is to be interr'd in the County of Nansemond,
where he was born.